Portable electronic devices, such as smartphones and tablets, are becoming very prevalent. Most of these devices include displays for presenting visual information, such as a graphical user interface and media content. Some displays are also touchscreens capable of receiving user input. A user may operate a device to view media, browse the Internet, check email, exchange messages, and execute applications.
Many of these devices are battery powered and are, therefore, limited to the amount of power stored in the batteries to operate. While processing circuitry in the device uses some of the power to operate the device, the displays for these devices also use a large portion of the power when in operation. Typically, a user can lower the brightness of the display in order to use less battery power. Even though lowering the brightness of a display can extend the battery life of an electronic device, lowering the brightness may not extend the battery life as long as a user desires.
Overview
Embodiments disclosed herein provide systems, methods, and software for dynamically managing power consumption of a device with a display. In particular, the size of the viewable area of the display may be dynamically controlled and portions of the display may be deactivated to reduce power consumption. The resizing of the viewable area of a screen may also reduce the number of applications running, thereby reducing power consumption. An indication of the amount of operation time, battery indicator, and/or energy left in the battery may be presented based at least in part on the dynamic resize of the display.